


Black Flowers

by TurtleTotem



Series: The Better Men [4]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, The Arcana Chronicles - Kresley Cole, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Cajuns, Defense Against the Dark Arts, F/M, Herbology, Inferi, The Forbidden Forest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-27
Updated: 2013-09-27
Packaged: 2017-12-27 19:04:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/982507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TurtleTotem/pseuds/TurtleTotem
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Evie and Jackson can't quite decide if they want nothing – or <i>everything</i> – to do with each other. An ill-advised venture into the Forbidden Forest may clarify matters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Black Flowers

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dracoangelica](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dracoangelica/gifts).



> This is set in the _Better Men_ 'verse just because, but you need zero knowledge of that 'verse to follow this story. The main characters are from Kresley Cole's post-apocalyptic YA series _The Arcana Chronicles_ (the first book is [Poison Princess](http://www.amazon.com/Poison-Princess-The-Arcana-Chronicles/dp/1442436654), and the second book, _Endless Knight,_ comes out October 1st!) 
> 
> If you haven't read _Poison Princess,_ I think you can still enjoy this as simply a Harry Potter story with new characters (who all happen to be from Louisiana...)
> 
> _Poison Princess_ and Harry Potter are two of the favorite things of one [Dracoangelica](dracoangelica.tumblr.com), my faithful beta and bosom friend. Happy birthday, Drake!

“Grace, Grayson, Greavey – Greene!” I strained onto my tiptoes to reach the book, and added it to the pile in my arms. It felt strange to find a biography of my own grandmother in the Hogwarts library, but Gran had, after all, been a well-known seer in her day. If I had to do a long essay on a seer for Divination class, Gran seemed the obvious choice.

I didn’t have a glimmer of the Sight myself, of course, but I was just as glad, after seeing how difficult life was for Matthew. Being there for him was the main reason I was taking Divination at all. I much preferred Herbology.

Turning around to look for a table, I realized I was being watched. Jackson Deveaux and his cronies were gathered in a corner, probably defacing school property, and Jackson himself was aiming a smug, appreciative smile in my direction. He’d enjoyed watching me strain to reach the book, I guessed. Ugh. Not that Jackson wasn’t hot – I doubted anyone at Hogwarts could claim indifference to his charm when he chose to turn it on – but he was just so… was there an antonym for ‘classy’?

Trying to ignore Jackson’s warm gaze, I dropped my books onto the table furthest from his, and began flipping through them, taking notes. Not only did Gran have a biography, there were entries about her in _Modern Revelations, Queens of Prophecy_ , and _Gift and Curse: Women with the Sight Speak Out_.

It was hard to focus with Jackson still watching me across the room. I tried to stack my books high enough to block his face, but he just smiled wider. To my dismay, he got up and crossed the room to sit on my table – _sit on my table, really?_ – and lean on one arm to murmur down at me.

“Evenin,’ Evangeline.”

“Hi,” I said curtly, and turned my eyes back to my book. I debated just telling him to get lost, but no, Evie Greene’s mother had raised a lady. It wasn’t like we were enemies – I’d barely known he existed until a few months ago, when we were assigned a History of Magic project together. His work had been good – better than I expected, which I felt guilty about. We’d actually worked well together. But ever since then he’d been… like this.

“Ain’t seen you around much lately. Studying too hard, you? You know what they say about all work and no play.” His grin widened. “This Jack ain’t a dull boy.”

“Don’t you have homework of your own to do, Jackson?”

“Already done it, _chere._ You want I should show you some of the tricks I’ve learned?”

I rolled my eyes and scratched down a note. “Yeah. I just bet you’ve learned things.”

Did Jackson’s smile tighten a bit? “You don’t think so?”

Irritated, I set my book down and looked up at him at last. “I think you’re so busy hanging with your lowlife delinquent friends and harassing unsuspecting girls, it’s a wonder you find time to even go to class.”

“You know nothing about my friends, Evie.” The smile was gone now. “And nothing about me.”

“I know as much as I want to know.”

“Oh, I’m sure. Pretty little pureblood, got the world in your hand, and you know as much as you want to know about it. But not as much as there _is_ to know about it, _to konprann?”_

“Oh, I’m the ignorant one? I have the highest Herbology marks in all of sixth year. What do you have?” I regretted the boast as soon as it left my lips – that wasn't the kind of thing I said, not the kind of person I was – but there was something about Jackson Deveaux that got under my skin like nothing else.

“Highest marks in Defense Against the Dark Arts," he replied instantly, looking smug.

I rolled my eyes. "Oh, goody for you."

"What, you doan believe me?"

"No, I believe you. The most violent, unsophisticated subject Hogwarts offers, all flash and smash – I'm not at all surprised you're the best at it."

Jackson's face was turning red. "Unsophisticated?"

"Should I have used a smaller word?" We were attracting a crowd, I realized, not only Jackson's friends but several other students drifting toward the noise. The librarian probably wouldn't be far behind.

_"Coo-yon fille,_ you don't understand nothing about _nothing._ Violent? Yeah. Flash and smash? Sure thing, if that's what it takes. If it weren't for wizards like me, _ma belle,_ you'd be making curtsies to Lord Voldemort right now. Name me one _herbologist_ who had anything to do with winning the war, _either_ war—"

I stood up. "Say that to Professor Longbottom's face, I dare you!"

"Because he had the brains to study pretty flowers second and defensive magic first!"

I shook my head. "Typical Gryffindor hothead. You don't know what you're talking about. Pretty flowers – I suppose you'd know exactly what to do if you got caught in a Devil's Snare, or came across a Fanged Geranium—"

"More than you'd know what to do with a dementor, or a dragon, or a werewolf in a full moon."

Several of the nearby kids were shushing us, looking around for the librarian who was sure to pounce any minute.

"Seems to me we could settle this easy enough," drawled one of Jackson's friends – Clotile, the girl he might or might not be dating, who wore too much makeup and always had her robes (and the blouse beneath) unbuttoned a little too far. "There's one place on the grounds where you'd have equal opportunity to showcase your skill sets. The Forbidden Forest."

Jackson turned on her with an expression of irritation. "You trying to get the girl killed?"

"Who says I'd be the one getting killed?" Without meaning to, I leaned forward across the desk, weight on my hands, so that when Jackson turned back toward me, our matched glares had only inches to travel. “Seems to me an herbologist can handle a forest.”

Slowly, Jackson's scowl morphed into a grin, condescending and deeply annoyed. "Fine then. Let's give it a go, _peekon."_

And that was how I ended up agreeing to a bet – whoever came out of the Forbidden Forest first, with one of its famous black flowers in hand, would win a prize from the other. The exact nature of that prize to be determined by the winner.

***

"Almost time to go, _mon ami,"_ Clotile said behind me, and shoved my face down into my homework; I shook her off irritably.

"This is some idea you had, Clotile. You need a better hobby than causing me trouble, you."

"Oh, you goan thank me for this trouble, Jack."

"First time for everything."

"I mean it, though." Clotile sat herself down in the middle of my homework, long legs swinging; on the other side of the Common Room, a prefect girl scowled, while the boy beside her leaned over to see better. "Shouting at a girl in the library, that wasn't getting you nowhere."

"And this will?"

Clotile shrugged lazily. The boy across the room fell out of his chair.

"Clotile, that girl wouldn't care beans about me if I paid her to. Which I wouldn't, because I can get a better girl by snapping my fingers, one that won't look down her nose at me and call me _unsophisticated."_

"Better? Sure, maybe. But she one _jolie fille,"_ Clotile said. "And I know you, Jack. You never goan be happy 'til you holding the leash of some high-class purebred bit--"

I was halfway out of my chair before I knew it. "You watch your mouth, Clotile."

She laughed, slow and satisfied, like I'd proved her point. "Yeah, you don't want one bit of Evie Greene."

"I want one bit of watching her make a fool of herself in the forest. Let's go." I stood up, gathered my books together, and shrugged on my cloak with the protective charms on it. I had a bet to win.

***

Mel tromped across the grounds like nothing short of the apocalypse would get in her way, head high and grinning like a cat. "This is the dumbest thing you've ever done, Evie Greene. I'm proud to know I've been such a good influence."

"Be sure to say that in my eulogy," I muttered, pulling my Hufflepuff scarf tighter around me in the evening chill. Mel had left her robes and scarf back in their dormitory; she never wore anything so pedestrian when she could avoid it. Instead, she was rocking prepster knee-pants, chunky ankle-breaker shoes and a purple sweater over a T-shirt bearing a large “Parental Advisory – Explicit Content” label. Jackson and I might have more in common than I thought – loud, bawdy besties with the most eye-catching outfit for every occasion.

“Hey, don’t tell me you’re backing out. You let that troglodyte win, you _know_ what prize he’s gonna name.” She waggled her eyebrows. “Of course that might not be so terrible...”

“Mel, I think you just set women’s rights back fifty years.”

“Okay, but seriously.” Mel put a hand on my arm, pulling me to a stop just as the dark line of the Forest came into view. “This is the dumbest thing you’ve ever done, and I think I have enough professional experience to judge. So in the interest of you _not_ handing your V-card to the ragin’ Cajun, or more likely getting disemboweled by fluffy forest creatures, you are totally letting me come with you on this thing, right?”

“What? No!” I gave her a look. “Bringing you along as the voice of reason always ends _so_ well for us. Besides, that’s not the terms of the deal. I have to go in alone.”

“You are so Puffy sometimes,” Mel groaned, as if her own scarf weren’t just as black and yellow. “Fair play is for losers. Like literally, you play fair and you lose.”

“Well, they’d notice, anyway.” I gestured to the two dark figures just visible at the edge of the Forest – Jackson and Clotile, already waiting. “So no cheating.”

“Ugh, fine,” Mel sighed, as if I had spoiled all her fun.

Jackson and Clotile were both in their school robes – no, I realized, Jackson was wearing something else, a dark cloak with a hood. The setting sun washed over his face as he pushed the hood back, and _damn_ but the drama of the movement looked good on him, all bright grey eyes and tousled black hair and grim expression.

“This ain’t no good, _chere._ You goan get yourself hurt. We call this off, no hard feelings.”

I knew full well I ought to take him up on it, but the idea of admitting I wasn't up to it stuck in my craw. “What, Jackson, you afraid you'll lose?”

_That_ got to him. "Not one bit."

"Then let's get going already."

He muttered under his breath – I caught _coo-yon_ more than once, and _thorn in my side_ – but he pulled his hood back up, drew his wand, and turned to face the treeline.

"The rules are simple," Clotile said. "First to come back to this spot with a black flower wins. Go!"

I took off at a run, and tried not to shiver as the darkness of the forest closed in over my head.

 

For the first few minutes, I could hear Jackson's footsteps off to my left, but by silent, mutual understanding, we steered away from each other. Soon I was out of sight and hearing of anyone at all, and the only light was the very occasional streak of sunset through the branches – and that was fading fast.

The second time I tripped on a root, I pulled my wand out of my robe pocket and muttered “Lumos.” Clear white light sprang from the tip, bright as a star, and I winced, feeling like I was holding a bull’s-eye. My old wand, I thought, would have dampened down, attuned to my wishes; it had been carved out of sugarcane from my mother’s plantation, and felt right as rain in my hand, but there’s a reason Ollivander’s doesn’t sell sugarcane wands. It broke only halfway through my first year. At least I’d been able to salvage the phoenix feather core for my current wand of pale, gleaming chestnut.

I turned in a slow circle, letting the wand-light wash over the plants around me. The trees were easy to identify – beech and oak, yew and sycamore – but the underbrush was thick and tangled, and I was startled to see several plants I didn’t recognize. Some of which seemed have… teeth.

_Just don’t touch anything,_ I told myself. _They won’t bother you if you don’t bother them._ But that was easier said than done; there didn’t seem to be any kind of path through this area, and I had to shove through underbrush to make any progress at all. Thorns caught at my hands and clothes, and knotgrass tangled around my feet; I had to use a few Disentanglement Charms to get free. I was more frustrated than nervous – until an unmistakable glitter of eyes caught the light of my wand.

I froze, staring at the eyes, trying to figure out what creature they belonged to. They almost seemed to be coming out of the bark of a tree… then the creature moved, and I finally made out its shape. A bowtruckle. Just a bowtruckle, glaring at me suspiciously as I approached its tree. I eased away from it, and let it fade away into the blackness.

I wasn’t afraid of a bowtruckle, but the encounter still left me on edge, my pulse tripping along fast enough to keep me breathless. I told myself it was just heightened nerves that made me hear footsteps and shufflings, see the shadow of something horse-like at the edge of my vision, and the hint of a far-off light much too low and yellowy to be a wand.

_Black flowers. Just find your black flowers and get out of here._ But I looked and looked without success, every creepy story I’d ever heard about the Forbidden Forest playing in the back of my head.

I didn’t realize I’d grown thirsty until I heard the burble of running water, somewhere in the distance. How long had I been walking? My legs ached, and the scattered bits of sunset light had long ago vanished. My thirst was unbearable now that I’d noticed it, and I tuned my ears as tightly as I could to the sound of water, and followed it.

I started recognizing plants again as I drew closer to the water – pipewort, glittering wood-moss, ferns and lichens – and felt my fear ease a bit. Plants had always been my friends. I knew how to handle them, and it often seemed, somehow, that they liked me – even non-magical ones that shouldn’t have had any way to show that.

With that in mind, I should have paid more attention when the vegetation grew thicker and more impassable the closer I grew to the water, as if trying to hold me back.

Instead, I pressed forward, and found a little spring-fed pool, and set my wand down to fill my hands with water.

The moment I touched the surface, the water trembled, and something moved in the depths. I gasped, choked on the water I’d been swallowing, and scrambled backward, accidentally knocking my glowing wand into the pool. It lit up like a floodlight, and I could clearly see what was approaching – a half-dozen figures, humanoid and yet not human at all. Gaunt, graceless and empty-eyed, their wet skin rotten and wrinkled like old paper bags.

They came out of the water with grasping hands, and staggered right at me.

***

I found the black flowers almost the moment Evie was out of sight. Didn’t even have to hunt for ‘em; I lit up my wand and there they were, like they’d been waiting just for me, and I couldn’t help but laugh. I gathered up a handful and tucked them in my pocket, but didn’t turn around and head back straight away. If I came back that fast, Evangeline wouldn’t never believe I hadn’t cheated. I’d have to wait a bit, make sure she had no way to wriggle out of giving me my prize.

I leaned against a tree for a bit, just smiling to myself, thinking what I might ask for. I knew what she expected me to ask for, and I was sorely tempted, but contrary to what she might think, I had more class than that. I’d settle for a kiss. A nice, long, toe-curling kiss, just to show her what she’s missing…

I came out of the daydream in a hurry when a spider the size of a man’s head tried to crawl up my leg. I muffled a shout, kicked it away, and chased it off with a spray of red sparks.

Over and done with that fast, and nothing much to someone who could keep his head. I hadn’t even needed any particular defensive spell. But it came to my mind that Evangeline wouldn’t know how to do even that much. Not a princess pureblood _herbologist_ like her. Hadn’t I known this was a dumb idea, and her the one likely to suffer for it? But I’d let her get my goat, and now she was wandering around this forest like any helpless babe.

I’d already won. It wouldn’t cost me anything to just… keep an eye on her for a bit.

It didn’t take me long to find her; the girl moved like an elephant, crushing and breaking and shoving, with no attempt to cover her trail. Couple times I saw plants with teeth, like giant Venus Flytraps, that had been right in her path, sure as the world – but there was no sign of blood or struggle. Like they’d just let her go by. Me, though, they didn’t like so much, and it took a couple Revulsion Jinxes to keep them from chewing me up. That slowed me down, but it still wasn’t long before I caught up to her, my own wand darkened to follow the light of hers.

Followed that girl for a time, sometimes close enough to touch, without her any the wiser. Oh, once or twice she turned around as if she’d heard something, but always in the wrong direction. _Pathetique._ She was a ready snack for anything that happened by.

She was lucky, though, and nothing happened. Until the damn pond.

I’d fallen back a bit, to go around a dense thorn bush that the girl was fool enough to push through, so I was all kind of confused when the place suddenly lit up like sunrise and Evie started screaming.

I smashed my way through the thorns, and saw six Inferi coming up out of the water.

That couldn’t be right, it _couldn’t._ Inferi hadn’t been seen since the war, almost twenty years gone, and never _here,_ this close to Hogwarts. But what else could they be? Haggard, death-pale, lurching things with nothing in their eyes – textbook Inferi.

And they wanted Evangeline.

“Stupefy!” I shouted, and the jet of red light hit the lead Inferius right in the chest, but the thing didn’t even pause. _Stupid_ Jack. Inferi didn’t think, so how could they be stunned?

_“Jackson?”_

“Run, Evie!” I racked my brain for a spell that might work – “Flipendo!”

That did something, at least – the lead Inferius was thrown backward into the water, and took one of the others with it. My throat seized up as I realized that second Inferi had been smaller. Child-sized.

_Coo-yon_ Evie hadn’t run. She was at the edge of the water, scrambling for her wand.

“Incendio!” I shouted, aiming at the Inferius stumbling toward her, and it burst into flame with an unexpected shriek. Evie spun toward the noise as she snatched her wand from the water, so that the floodlight of the pool died into a single beam of light from Evie’s hand.

I sent more fire, hitting more Inferi who staggered away and collapsed, smoking and stinking. But there were still those two I’d knocked back into the water, and I turned toward Evie just in time to see one of them grab her from behind.

A Fire-making Curse might get Evie as much as the Inferius, so instead I attacked it myself, hearing its fingers break as I pulled them off Evangeline.

The Inferius was _strong,_ strong as any gator, and like a gator it got me in a death roll into the water before I knew it.

Panic makes you stupid, gets you killed. I’m not somebody who panics. But sinking into the dark water with an undead monster locked around me like iron bars, I came awful close. Especially with my wand pinned against my chest, useless, even if I had air to shout a spell.

I heard a shout, maybe _Incendio,_ distorted by water and the sound of my own struggles. Steam hissed and swirled off the Inferius’s back, but it only dragged me down deeper.

“Lumos!”

The water lit again, lightning-bright everywhere, and the Inferius convulsed, loosening its grip. I fought toward the shore, dragging it with me, and broke the surface with a gasp.

“This way!” Evie cried. The Inferius was clawing at me with its broken fingers, I could feel my skin tearing, and a horrible pain in my shoulder where its _teeth_ were digging in. With a shout of pain, I threw myself toward Evie’s voice – and hit something, a wall, softer than stone or wood and _moving._ Something like tentacles wrapped around me and the Inferius, yanking us up in different directions. They were choking tight and there was one around my neck—

“Don’t move! Jackson, stop struggling!”

I could see Evangeline now, a beacon of wand-light in the dark forest, scattered bits of fire on the ground around her. Her long blonde hair was full of leaves and twigs.

“Don’t move!” she repeated. “Be still, be still!”

I don’t just stop struggling, me. I’m in trouble, I fight my way out of it, I don’t lay down and die. But Evie had to have a reason for saying it, so I held my breath and forced myself to be still.

Immediately the vines – I could see now they were vines – stopped tightening around me. Off to the side, the Inferius was thrashing, its strength doing it little good, three vines winding around it for every one that it broke. After a minute or two, the vines actually tore it into pieces, and dropped them to the ground.

I was sinking slowly, I realized then, the plant loosening around me, lowering me back toward the forest floor.

“That’s right,” Evie said, breathless but soothing, like she was talking to the plant. “Just relax.”

I let my last bit of tension flow out of my muscles, and the vines dropped me at Evie’s feet.

“Devil’s Snare,” Evie said. “Lets go if you don’t fight it. A-are you okay?”

I looked up at her from the dirt, bruised and bleeding and half-drowned. “Never better, _peekon.”_

***

I got Jackson onto his feet and we hauled ass out of there. It looked like all the… things… were dead, but we didn’t have to discuss our non-inclination to find out for sure.

“Inferi,” Jackson explained, when we stopped to rest. “Dead bodies, turned to puppets by dark magic.”

“Who would do that? Why?”

“Search me.” Jackson leaned heavily against a tree trunk, then winced and pulled away, touching his shoulder. His dark cloak was torn and bloody.

“Let me see that,” I said.

“It’s nothing.”

“Jackson, it could be hours before we find our way out of this place, and I’m not dragging your ass through the woods when you bleed out. Get over here and let me see.”

“I know exactly where we’re going,” he grumbled, but stood still for me to move his cloak out of the way and aim my wand-light at the bloody spot.

“Jackson, that’s teeth marks!”

“Don’t worry, I’m not goan turn into a zombie. Inferi don’t work that way.”

“Still, I can’t imagine its mouth was very clean.”

“Or its claws.” He raised his arm a bit, showing deep, bleeding grooves over his arms and ribs. I hissed between my teeth.

“Well… we’ll let Madam Pomfrey worry about infection, but we need to get this bleeding stopped.” I took off my scarf and robes – the forest was pretty chilly in just my T-shirt and jeans, but I’d make do – and started wrapping and tying them around his injuries. Jackson sat still for it, watching me intently. I was about done when he grabbed my hand.

“You’re burned, you.”

“Not much. Flaming zombie-thing came at me.” I shuddered.

“Got close enough to touch you…” He looked sick. For the first time since those things had come out of the water, I had the time and space to wonder why Jackson had jumped in to protect me, what he was even doing there.

“So, what happened anyway, you were stalking me through the forest?” My voice came out more accusatory than I meant, and I saw him bristle.

“You’re lucky I was, or where would you be right now?”

“I know that. Just wondering what you were up to.”

“Wondering if I’d have to do exactly what I did do – keep you from getting your fool self killed.” His voice was harsh, but his hands were still gently examining my burned wrist. A breeze curled through the dark trees, carrying the scent of honeysuckle from somewhere in the forest.

I wanted to snap at him for assuming I couldn’t take care of myself, but as it turned out I had needed his help. And then he’d needed mine. It evened out.

“You’re welcome,” Jackson added.

I smiled. “Well, you’re welcome too, Jackson.”

He glared at me, but again his hands didn’t match his supposed anger, pulling a leaf out of my hair and then tucking the lock behind my ear. “Once folks save my life, I let them call me Jack.”

He'd tried to persuade me to call him Jack before, during our History of Magic project. I hadn't done it, hadn't wanted to be friends with the cocky, vulgar, angry mess that was Jackson Deveaux no matter how hot he was. And he was still all those things. But he was also the boy who'd wrestled a zombie to save a girl who annoyed the tar out of him as often as not. "Well," I said, "I guess once folks save _my_ life, I call them whatever they want me to."

He grinned. "Whatever I want, huh?"

I punched his arm – gently, away from his wounds. "Lech."

"For you, _chere?_ Always."

How was I supposed to react to that? I settled for rolling my eyes and turning away. "Let's get out of this place before anything else attacks us."

"Sure thing," he said. "Only the grounds are the _other_ way."

 

After about fifteen minutes' walk, he eased his cloak off, wincing as it moved over his shoulder, and put it around me.

"What – no, I'm fine, Jackson—"

"You're shivering. And it's Jack."

"Clotile call you Jack?" I had not meant to ask that, hadn't even known I was thinking it. I bit my lip, cheeks burning, and hunched down into the cloak. Even torn and bloody, it was a welcome shield against the chill. And it… smelled good. Aside from the blood.

Jackson was chuckling at me. "Clotile? Sure, she call me Jack. Known me longer than anyone, her."

"So you're… close friends?"

Jack was looking far too pleased with himself. "Oh, we're more than friends, me and Clotile."

I didn't know whether to be – angry, disgusted, disappointed? Was he really flirting with me and then outright telling me had a girl—

"She's my sister."

I raised my eyebrows. "Oh, you _do_ come from deep in the bayou."

His eyes flashed with temper at the joke, but he continued. "We always thought she might be. The _fouille-merde_ that sired me was one of the three or four candidates Clotile’s _mere_ could name. Then we both turned up with magic, which neither of our mothers have. Old Ollivander even says our wand cores come from the same dragon.” He pulled his wand from a pocket. Ash wood, of course, hallmark of the brave-but-bullheaded. “You want to hold my wand, _bebe?”_

I gave him a withering glare. “No thanks.”

“Your loss.”

I started walking again. “So, wait, your father was a wizard? I thought you were Muggleborn.”

“I got no father,” Jack said stiffly. “So Muggleborn’s fine by me.”

He held up a low-hanging branch so I could pass, then eased up close behind me.

“I like you asking about Clotile, Evangeline,” he murmured in my ear. “Green’s a good color on you.”

“Oh, really? Too bad I’m not a Slytherin.” I was surprised to hear my voice shake. The boy was insanely hot, okay? I’d never denied that. It was kinda nice, in the cold dark forest full of monsters, to feel him close by, sturdy and dangerous.

“Slytherin? _Non, ma belle fille,_ I like you just like you are.” He slid a hand over my shoulder, turning me around to face him. “More fool me, but that’s ole Jack for you.”

He was closer than I thought, and instinctively I backed up a step. My back touched a tree trunk, and he closed the distance between us quickly, still holding my shoulder and now my waist – gently, a grip I could easily break if I wanted to.

I didn’t.

Somewhere that honeysuckle breeze was still blowing. My nervous fingers groped behind me, found some flowering vine wound around the tree trunk. What was I nervous for? Jackson would hardly be the first boy to kiss me.

But I was suspecting he’d be the best.

“Miss Greene?”

We jumped apart at the strange voice, light suddenly shining in our faces.

“And Mr. Deveaux. How nice that you found each other.” The scarred, rounded face of Professor Longbottom looked unusually sinister in the reflected wand-light. “Really, you two could have stayed in the library for that. Just how long did you think your friends could hang about on the edge of the Forbidden Forest without attracting a teacher’s attention?”

***

By the time Professor Longbottom, Madam Pomfrey, and the headmaster himself had finished their individual scoldings, even Jackson was looking humbled, though I wasn’t sure how sincerely. Madam Pomfrey had my few scratches and burns put to rights quick enough, but I let her bed me down in the hospital wing anyway, next to Jack, who looked pretty pale by the time she’d finished examining his wounds. I held his hand while Madam Pomfrey applied her spells and ointments, and was a little surprised that he let me.

“I think we’d be in worse trouble,” I said when we were finally alone, “if the teachers weren’t so freaked out about the Inferi.”

Jack nodded. “I heard Xavier telling Longbottom – he figures they were left by Voldemort, back when he was a student. Maybe his first big experiment with the Dark Arts. Seems there was a family of Muggle tourists went missing around here at about the right time.”

“You’re supposed to be confined to your dormitory, Miss Warren!” came Madam Pomfrey’s irritated voice from the beyond the archway.

“I just want to see if Evie’s okay.” That was Mel, laying on the pitiful as hard as she could. “Oh, pretty please? She’s my best friend and I was so worried.”

Madam Pomfrey snorted, undeceived. “Five minutes.”

Mel squealed and ran down the length of the wing to bounce onto my bed. “You’re alive!”

“Gack! Not if you squeeze me that hard!”

“And you!” She turned to Jackson. “I don’t even like you, but I will hug the shit out of you anyway if you really did rescue Evie from a pack of the moaning undead.”

Jackson grinned and opened his arms. I backhanded him across the chest.

“It was a group effort,” I said.

“Uh-huh, uh-huh.” Mel glanced from one to the other us, a knowing look in her eye. “A little mutual assistance, a little synergetic union, and you both return in one piece. But what about our fateful wager?”

I chuckled and pulled out the surprise I’d been hiding – the black flowers I’d found clutched in my own hands when Professor Longbottom surprised us. “I guess I win,” I said, turning toward Jackson – only to see him doing the same, emptying squashed black petals from his pocket.

“Found these before I even found _you,_ Evangeline. Now who would you say won?”

I growled and crossed my arms. “We’ll call it a tie.”

_“Mais non, ma peekon fille._ No tie. I say we both win.”

“What’s the difference?”

“The difference,” he said, running his fingers down my jawline and leaning closer, “is this way we both get to claim a prize.”

And what do you know, we picked the same thing.


End file.
